, also released in arcades outside of Japan as ''Mega Force'', is a 1984 vertically

scrolling shooter Shoot 'em ups (also known as shmups or STGs) are a subgenre of action games. There is no consensus as to which design elements compose a shoot 'em up; some restrict the definition to games featuring spacecraft and certain types of character m ...

video game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...

developed and published by Tehkan for arcades. It was ported to the

Nintendo Entertainment System The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan on 15 July 1983 as the and was later released as the redesigned NES in several test markets in the ...

Hudson Soft was a Japanese video game company known for releasing numerous titles across video game consoles, home computers, and mobile phones. Headquartered in the Midtown Tower in Tokyo, it also maintained an office in the Hudson Building in Sapporo. F ...

, with Tehkan's successor Tecmo releasing it outside Japan.

Gameplay

In the game, the player pilots a starship called the ''Final Star'', while shooting various enemies and destroying enemy structures for points. Unlike later vertical scrolling shooters, like

Toaplan was a Japanese video game developer based in Tokyo. It was best known for its catalogue of scrolling shooters and other arcade video games. The company was founded in 1979 but its gaming division was established in 1984 by former Orca and Crux ...

's ''

Twin Cobra ''Twin Cobra'', known as in Japan, is a vertically scrolling shooter developed by Toaplan and released for Arcade game, arcades in 1987 by Taito in Japan and Europe, then in North America by Romstar. It is a sequel to the 1985 arcade game ''T ...

'', the ''Final Star'' had only two levels of weapon power and no secondary weapons like missiles and/or bombs. Each stage in the game was named after a letter of the

Greek alphabet The Greek alphabet has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early 8th century BC. It was derived from the earlier Phoenician alphabet, and is the earliest known alphabetic script to systematically write vowels as wel ...

. In certain versions of the game, there is an additional level called "Infinity" (represented by the infinity symbol) which occurs after Omega, after which the game repeats indefinitely. In the NES version, after defeating the Omega target, the player can see a black screen with

Tecmo was a Japanese video game company founded in 1967. It had its headquarters in the Kudankita district of Tokyo. Its subsidiary, Tecmo Inc, was located in Torrance, California. Prior to 1986, Tecmo was formerly known as Tehkan. Tecmo is known for ...

's logo, announcing the future release of the sequel '' Super Star Force''. After that, the infinity target becomes available and the game repeats the same level and boss without increasing the difficulty.

Reception

In Japan, ''Game Machine'' listed ''Star Force'' on its December 1, 1984, issue as the fourteenth most-successful table arcade unit at the time.

Legacy

Sequels

* '' Super Star Force: Jikūreki no Himitsu'', released in 1986 for the Japanese Nintendo Famicom. * '' Final Star Force'', released for arcades in 1992.

Ports and related releases

''Star Force'' was ported and published in 1985 by

to both the

MSX MSX is a standardized home computer architecture, announced by ASCII Corporation on June 16, 1983. It was initially conceived by Microsoft as a product for the Eastern sector, and jointly marketed by Kazuhiko Nishi, the director at ASCII Corpo ...

home computer and the

Family Computer The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan on 15 July 1983 as the and was later released as the redesigned NES in several test markets in the U ...

(Famicom) in Japan. Sales of the game were promoted through the first nationwide video game competition to be called "a caravan", although it was not the first event of its kind organized by Hudson (they had previously promoted '' Lode Runner'' with a similar event). The North American and European versions for the

(NES) were published two years later, in 1987, with significant revisions, and with Tecmo credited rather than Hudson on the title screen and box art. According to Keiji Yamagishi, the NES version was created separately at

and is distinct from the port released for the Famicom by Hudson. Although the NES version is immediately recognizable as having a great deal in common with the Hudson version released in Japan, there are significant alterations to the graphics, music, and controls and gameplay. Several bugs in gameplay were fixed (debatably making the NES version more difficult) that allow the player (in the Japanese version) to prevent new enemies from appearing ("spawning") by ''not'' shooting the enemies already on screen. ''Star Force'' was also ported to the

SG-1000 The is a home video game console manufactured by Sega. It was Sega's first entry into the home video game hardware business. Developed in response to a downturn in arcades starting in 1982, the SG-1000 was created on the advice of Hayao Nak ...

Sega is a Japanese video game company and subsidiary of Sega Sammy Holdings headquartered in Tokyo. It produces several List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises for arcade game, arcades and video game cons ...

, and

X68000 The is a home computer created by Sharp Corporation. It was first released in 1987 and sold only in Japan. The initial model has a 10 Megahertz, MHz Motorola 68000 Central processing unit, CPU, 1 Megabytes, MB of Random Access Memory, ...

by Dempa Shimbunsha. In 1995, along with two other NES shooters, the Famicom version of ''Star Force'' was remade by Hudson Soft with minimal upgrades for the

Super Famicom The Super Nintendo Entertainment System, commonly shortened to Super Nintendo, Super NES or SNES, is a Fourth generation of video game consoles, 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan, 1991 in No ...

as part of the Japan-only release of the '' Caravan Shooting Collection''. The same version was also included in Hudson's compilation of NES shooters in 2006 in ''Hudson Best Collection Vol. 5''. The original arcade version was later added to the compilation titled ''

Tecmo Classic Arcade ''Tecmo Classic Arcade'' is a collection of classic Tecmo arcade games for the Xbox (console), Xbox. This collection was released on September 13, 2005 in the U.S., October 21, 2005 in Europe and October 27, 2005 in Japan, and contains all of th ...

'', which was released for the

Xbox Xbox is a video gaming brand that consists of four main home video game console lines, as well as application software, applications (games), the streaming media, streaming service Xbox Cloud Gaming, and online services such as the Xbox networ ...

. In 2009, the arcade version was made available for download on the

Wii The Wii ( ) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was released on November 19, 2006, in North America, and in December 2006 for most other regions of the world. It is Nintendo's fifth major home game console, f ...

Virtual Console The Virtual Console was a line of downloadable retro video games for Nintendo's Wii and Wii U home video game consoles and the Nintendo 3DS family of handheld systems. The Virtual Console lineup consisted of titles originally released on pa ...

for 500

Wii Points The Wii Shop Channel is a discontinued digital distribution service for the Wii video game console. The service allowed users to purchase and play additional software for the Wii (called Channels), including exclusive games (branded WiiWare), ...

as one of the four initial offerings for the "Virtual Console Arcade" category of the Wii Shop Channel (the other three being '' Gaplus'', ''

Mappy is a 1983 platform video game developed and published by Namco for arcades. It runs on Namco's '' Super Pac-Man'' hardware modified to support horizontal scrolling. The name "Mappy" is likely derived from , a slightly pejorative Japanese sl ...

'', and ''

The Tower of Druaga is a 1984 action role-playing maze video game developed and published by Namco for arcades. Controlling the golden-armored knight Gilgamesh, the player is tasked with scaling 60 floors of the titular tower in an effort to rescue the maiden ...

'' from

Namco was a Japanese multinational video game and entertainment company founded in 1955. It operated video arcades and amusement parks globally, and produced video games, films, toys, and arcade cabinets. Namco was one of the most influential c ...

). In 1986, Hudson Soft released the shoot 'em up game '' Star Soldier'', which is considered a spiritual successor to ''Star Force''. The game spawned numerous sequels. Hamster Corporation released the game as part of the

Arcade Archives is a series of emulated arcade games from the late 1970s, 1980s, 1990s and early 2000s developed and published by Hamster Corporation. A sub-series called focuses on re-releasing Neo Geo titles in their original arcade format, unlike many s ...

series for the

PlayStation 4 The PlayStation 4 (PS4) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Announced as the successor to the PlayStation 3 in February 2013, it was launched on November 15, 2013, in North America, November 29, 2013, in ...

in 2015 and

Nintendo Switch The is a video game console developed by Nintendo and released worldwide in most regions on March 3, 2017. Released in the middle of the Eighth generation of video game consoles, eighth generation of home consoles, the Switch succeeded the ...

in 2018.

Notes

References

External links

* {{KLOV game, id=9759
''Star Force'' at arcade-history
1984 video games Arcade Archives games Arcade video games Hamster Corporation games Hudson Soft games MSX games Multiplayer and single-player video games Nintendo Entertainment System games SG-1000 games Tecmo games Vertically scrolling shooters Video games developed in Japan Virtual Console games Virtual Console games for Wii X68000 games